Not a Day Goes By, to Speak in the Old Style, Without Some Blessing

The LSE Festival (2021) is a week of virtual events free and open to all, taking place from 1 - 6 March 2021, about the direction the world could and should be taking after the COVID crisis and how social science research can shape it.

We are delighted that Dr Olga Sobolev and Dr Angus Wrenn, together with LSE SU Drama Society, present an evening of Absurdist drama, preceded by a discussion with Professor Paul Dolan, a leading expert on the application of positive psychology in the contemporary world.

Talk in English by Renata Ávila, Executive Director, Smart Citizenship Foundation

While the Web is 30 years old, the last decade has been the most challenging for our societies to preserve and advance freedom of speech. It started by celebrating the power of the Internet and social networks to transform democracy and open societies; it continued with a celebration of so-called “Internet Freedom”, as the world witnessed the “Arab Spring” unfolding. It shifted power and revolutionised journalism with the courageous publications of WikiLeaks, the most radical institutional innovation for journalism, inspiring a global movement of digital whistleblowing. And then, freedom of speech moved backwards: sophisticated surveillance, censorship, increased controls and restrictions of content, and fake news. Citizens are blamed for either producing or believing, and even a genocide in Myanmar may have been triggered by social networks. Are our rights at risk? Can we reverse the trend? The talk will analyse key moments that shaped freedom of speech online during the last decade and a defining period ahead that can change everything.

LSE Festival: New World DisOrders (The New World Gives the Orders)

Politics and philosophy, discussion and performance:  Orwell as prophet; Pinter as protester, and ‘Convenience’ as the new order of our virtual world. LSE Language Centre, in collaboration with the LSE Student Union Drama Society, presents an evening of dramas and discussion. 

Since the end of the Cold War there has been continual speculation and discussion regarding the emergence of a New World Order in the apparent vacuum of power which was left. Noam Chomsky pessimistically concluded that New World Order simply meant ‘The New World’ (i.e. the USA) now gave the orders.  Dr Kai Spiekermann, an expert on modern alternatives to democracy, and author with Robert Goodin of An Epistemic Theory of Democracy and Masha Karp, author of a new biography of Orwell, consider the extent to which a New World Order can be identified, and in what ways this affirms or contradicts Orwell’s pessimistic, dystopian vision of the future, in Nineteen Eighty-Four, as it approaches its sixtieth anniversary

The latest videos from LSE Research in Mandarin are now available.

LSE Research in Mandarin aims to showcase LSE’s world class research and multilingual faculty, is being filmed at LSE’s new media studio. From media industries to social policy change and future economic development in China. 

1. China UK Relationship
2. Chinese political thoughts
3. Geographical indications in EU and beyond
4. Health insurance reform in China
5. Organisational behaviour and management
6. Performance based pay in China and UK schools
7. Modernisation of China